There are over a million Tajik migrants in Russia

MOSCOW, September 15. /ITAR-TASS/. The flow of workers from Tajikistan to Russia has decreased considerably as compared to last year, first of all because of their violations of Russian regulations, Tajik Ambassador to Russia Imomuddin Sattorov said in an interview with ITAR-TASS.

According to the data of the Russian Federal Migration Service, there are over a million Tajik migrants in Russia, he said, adding labour migration certainly supports not only Tajikistan’s economy, but also is a source to form Russia’s GDP.

However, the number of migrants from Tajikistan has decreased in Russia as compared to last year due to administrative offenses - 128,000 are on the list of persons banned from entering Russia, and the number may rise to 300,000, the ambassador said.

The situation causes concern, he said. “We have talks with Russian law-enforcement authorities to settle issues related to any violations of the Russian legislation.”

In late 2013, an agreement came into force on regulations for presence of Tajik citizens in Russia, and last March, the Russian parliament’s upper house Federation Council ratified a protocol to the Russian-Tajik agreement to prolong the work permit period for Tajik citizens to three years. A work permit also allows prolonging the period to stay in Russia.

To improve control over migration processes, Russia introduces regulations that will come into force in January 1, 2015 for citizens of CIS countries to cross the Russian border only with foreign passports (except for Customs Union and common economic area states). Citizens of countries that signed an intergovernmental agreement of November 30, 2000 on visa-free travel do not need visas to enter and leave Russia.

The Tajik ambassador in Moscow said that an intergovernmental commission would meet in December 2014 to sign a number of documents regulating labour activities of Tajik migrants in Russia. Tajikistan is doing everything possible to lift the ban for some categories of citizens, including students and those who have relatives in Russia. If a law on licenses for legal entities is passed in Russia, the problem of quotas will be removed, and it will be easier to enter Russia's territory, the diplomat said.